


No Man is a Failure

by Escalus



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - It's a Wonderful Life Fusion, Christmas, F/M, Gen, Nightmares, Redemption, Regret, Theo Appreciation Week 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-22
Updated: 2018-11-22
Packaged: 2019-08-27 09:19:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16699753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Escalus/pseuds/Escalus
Summary: Remember, George: no man is a failure who has friends.- Frank Capra,It's a Wonderful Life





	No Man is a Failure

It was the day after Christmas, and a brisk wind whipped across the patchy snow. Even though it was December in Beacon Hills, it had been a beautiful one: not too cold and just enough snow to make the break feel special. Almost everyone had managed to come home from school. They had spent yesterday with friends and family, but even the best times could be interrupted by business.

“Theo, you don’t have to go with me.” Scott offer was sincere. He was probably trying to convey it by the smile on his face, but since he smiled at everyone like that all the time, it didn’t convince Theo. Scott would absolutely try to run this errand alone, even though it would cut into his first crisis-free week since Monroe’s crusade began. 

“It’s not like I have a lot of friends and family I’m going to miss, Scott.” Theo rolled his eyes while leaning against the front bumper of the jeep. Scott’s offer would have been almost sweet if it didn’t feel like the thousandth time he had made it. 

“I know.” Scott said softly. “But you’ve got more friends than you think, and you know that’s not the only reason that you may not want to go on this trip.”

“And I’ve told you – I’m not afraid of them. To be honest, I’m far more afraid of this death trap we’re going to be riding in. Are you sure that Stiles is still your best friend? He’s not plotting your death? Because this thing is a fatal car accident statistic waiting to happen.”

Liam sat not far away on the stoop of the McCall House, dressed in the sweater his mother had made for him. “Theo, maybe you should be … a little afraid? There’s plenty you could do here until Scott gets back. You could help us try out all the cool shit we got for Christmas, or help us plan New Year’s Eve.” Liam looked to Scott who nodded vigorously in agreement. 

“It sounds like fun, and spending days in a car with me isn’t fun. And it wouldn’t be any problem for me to drive there, do what I have to do, and then come back for you.” Scott good naturedly agreed with his beta. 

“Ugh. It _is_ a problem for you, Scott. It’s a seventeen-hour drive to Shiprock. Then it’s a seventeen hour back just to pick me up, and then it’s a thirty-hour drive to the Calaveras stronghold in time for the meeting. I don’t see why I need to make you drive an extra thirty hours when I can ride along with you. You’d come back from the trip exhausted.” Theo’s exasperation was beginning to show no matter how much he wanted to hide it.

Scott sighed. “That’s why I’m leaving early …”

“Scott. Liam. If the skin-walkers wanted me back in the ground, do you really think that they wouldn’t come here and do it?”

“I don’t know!” Liam exclaimed. “Maybe they can’t go far from their place of power. That’s what Stiles believes, anyway.”

“Well, if Stiles said so,” Theo snarked. “Look, Scott, you need me in Mexico, and this jalopy isn’t going to able to survive sixty hours of driving in a week.”

“Okay,” Scott finally relented, though he kept the puppy-dog eyes focused on Theo. “I trust your judgement, but at the first sign of trouble, I’m getting you out of there.”

**********

Theo was very thankful that it was ridiculously hot in the desert for this time of the year, and that this piece-of-shit jeep didn’t have anything remotely resembling air conditioning. He didn’t want Scott to think he was sweating because he was nervous. He _definitely_ didn’t want Scott to think he was because he was nervous about being this close to the skin-walkers.

“I’m going to have to get their attention,” Scott sighed. “Sometimes they’ll show up; sometimes they won’t. I hope they’ll let me talk to Kira about her dad’s surgery, but it might take a while to even see if I get the chance.”

“I could go with …”

“Wait in the jeep, Theo. You may be confident that they won’t do anything to you, but I’m not.” Scott shut the door of the jeep hard and started walking toward the strange rock formation.

Theo took out his phone; he’d play a game until Scott got back from delivering the message. When he had first learned that Scott intended to try and contact his former girlfriend, he hadn’t argued against this whole trip because, while he personally didn’t think that creatures as old and as powerful as the skin-walkers would let Kira out of her training simply to visit her sick father, it was basic human decency to at least try to tell her about it. He was trying to master that particular quality; it wasn’t easy.

Time flew by and before he knew it, he had completed a level in Candy Crush. He lifted his arms in triumph only to see a Skin-walker standing three feet away from him outside the door.

No one but he and the skin-walker would ever know about the very unmanly yelp he gave at that sight. It must have amused the woman, because she smiled predatorily under the black make-up that covered half her face.

“Don’t send me back!” The way his pleading voice shot up an octave made Theo hate himself, but for all his bravado, the fear came surging back. 

Black Night – and Theo didn’t know how he knew her name, but he did – shook her head slowly though she projected an aura of fanged contempt. “There is no need.”

Reflex overrode common sense, so Theo got out of the jeep to stand before her. He was afraid, but he wanted more than anything to show that he was not afraid. He’d kick himself later for acting on a contradiction. 

Additionally, he’d kick himself again because he couldn’t keep his damn mouth shut. “Why isn’t there need?”

The skin-walker smirked at him. She was obviously waiting for him to ask a question, but that question hadn’t been the one she was waiting for.

“Why me?”

Black Night cocked her head to the side and nodded in appreciation. That seemed to be a more acceptable question.

“Yeah, yeah, I killed my sister and Tracy and Josh. But Peter Hale killed his own niece and a bunch of other people, and you didn’t come for him. Deucalion whacked a whole shitload of people, and you had to have heard about that.” The words came out in a rush. “Yeah, I killed people – I killed _family_ \-- and you sent me to Hell for it. But you didn’t send Gerard Argent to Hell, and he … “ 

Theo trailed off. The skin-walker’s confident silence was very unnerving.

“Did you think our message was delivered to punish you?”

“Well, yeah!”

She smiled toothily at him. “It was meant to help you. It was a gift”

“What the fuck?”

“Look at where you are.” 

Theo could have been oblivious and looked around at the desert he found himself in, but he knew it was figurative. He knew she was referring to where he found himself in his life. He was glad not to be under the ground anymore, and he wasn’t in constant threat of death. Scott and Liam treated him okay, he guessed, but he still wasn’t pack. 

“Couldn’t you have like paid for therapy instead?”

“You were a child, taken by the wicked and the powerful and shaped in their image. You were their creation not just in body, but in mind. You stole your sister’s heart and that was the beginning of what made you what you are. In order to grow into something else, you had to be remade.”

Theo caught a breath. It had felt like being remade. It had felt like being a piece of metal heated in a forge and hammered on an anvil again and again and again. 

“We would not do this for those men, for they knew what they were doing when they made their wicked choices.” Her voice dripped contempt. “They had opportunities you did not have; they had other paths they could have taken. We wanted to give you the opportunity.”

There was a sour pit in his stomach. He couldn’t argue with her; he didn’t want to argue with her. It just felt unfair. He remembered that time in the Pit. Even more than a year later, he still couldn’t bear to spend more than a few minutes in the hospital’s morgue. Or any morgue for that matter. 

Theo cast a glance behind him. Scott was probably still trying to talk to Kira. He didn’t know why precisely, but his fear had been replaced by anger. The idea that they had put him through all of that for some form of salvation felt like red-hot nails buried in his scalp. Who were these people to think he needed saving? Who were these people to think that they knew what he wanted?

“Well, thanks for nothing. No one asked you to save me! I didn’t need saving!” He shouted, even as he knew it was a lie. And from the look on her face, the skin-walker knew it was a lie and she was … offended by his outburst.

“Didn’t you?”

Theo didn’t have time to stutter out an apology before the world went black.

**********

With a shout, Theo shot up from where he had been lying down. His breath came in great heaving gasps. For a second, he didn’t know where he was, but that passed quickly. He was in his own bed, his own sheets pooled around him. He blinked as he looked around; he wasn’t alone.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Malia growled from the edge of the bed, where she was pulling on a black lace stocking. “I didn’t make enough noise to wake you up.”

“Just a dream.” Theo tried to casually shrug it off even as his breathing slowed.

Malia harrumphed and went back to getting dressed. There was an itch in the back of Theo’s mind. He had to make sure Malia didn’t think he was weak. Naked, he crawled over to her and whispered huskily. “Why are you in such a rush to go? It’s Christmas vacation, baby.” 

“You wanted the pack to meet. Stiles is already downstairs.” She complained to him. “You’re the one who insists we hold them during the ass-end of the morning.”

“We have time …” Theo leaned into kiss her, and she turned her head to the side sharply. He knew she would. His goal was to get her mind off his nightmare, whatever it had been.

“No, Theo. We had a deal.”

“We could make a new deal.” He put one hand on her shoulder as softly as he could. Theo knew exactly how much charm he could exude if he put his mind to it. 

She shrugged off his hand and stood up, somehow both angry with him and reluctant to go at the same time. “Look, you’re fun, and I’m grateful that you helped me with my mother. But I’ve told you there’s never going to be anymore between us than … what we have now.”

“What we have now is great.” He lay back on the bed, hiding nothing. “Don’t you want more?”

“Not from you.” Her voice was sour. 

Confident that she was on the defensive and no longer curious about his display of weakness, Theo shrugged languidly. “I’ll be down in a bit. Do me a favor and make sure that Stiles took a shower and his medicine? If he’s all twitchy and smelly, I’m going to want to punch him, and that’s not going to make for a productive meeting.”

Malia nodded silently and headed downstairs. 

Theo opened the door to his closet. It was a casual meeting, so he went with casual clothes: gray sweat pants and a 49ers t-shirt. He wasn’t even going to put on shoes. He found that the pack he had didn’t really notice when he dressed up for them, so why bother?

On his way out the door, there was a buzz on his phone. It was a text from a number he had hoped never to see again: _Colombo’s. Midnight._

“Fuck me,” Theo hissed. “What the hell does he want?” 

There was no time to think about it now, people were waiting for him. The pack used the basement recreation room for their meetings. 

Everyone was present by the time he got downstairs; the Christmas tree that Theo had insisted his ‘parents’ put up blinked in the corner. The pack had keys, and they had long ago learned that Theo’s faux parents wouldn’t question their movements. Malia was in her usual spot in the chair next to his throne – a comfortable recliner. Theo insisted that she sit there. Not only did their ‘relationship’ make most of his other betas jealous, but it periodically drove Stiles into a seething rage, and who didn’t enjoy that?

Stiles himself had claimed the far corner, perched on a stool, his eyes focused on Theo the moment he entered the room. The Christmas lights made him look strange, but that was nothing new. Stiles had three settings nowadays: Wrecked, Ruined, and Vicious. There were days where he didn’t eat, didn’t sleep, didn’t take his pills, and essentially didn’t take care of himself at all. On those days, he was a nervous, twitchy smelly Wreck, and he was pretty useless all around.

Then there were days where he was a nothing more than a robot, suppressing all emotion so he could function at something resembling normalcy, a Ruin of regret. He was more useful on those days, if Malia or Theo could coax him into participating with the rest of the pack.

Once in a while, he was Vicious, a conniving schemer with a thousand bones to pick with a thousand people. On those days, he was the Void that Theo had been so desperate to possess. Stiles was the most useful then, but he was also the most dangerous. He was at home in a room full of monsters, for whatever had bloomed from the seeds of darkness planted in him long ago was now in full flower. He was cunning, deceitful and lethal in his improvisations, exactly as Theo had wanted. The only problem, of course, was that Stiles’ schemes always had two edges; they were just as sharp to the pack as to the pack’s enemies.

Stiles’ eyes tonight told Theo that the Void was here, and he was interested in playing his amusing games. Theo could have done without it at this meeting.

Most of the other betas stayed away from Stiles, strangely intimidated by the human. It wasn’t surprising; Theo had chosen his betas for their ability to be lead around by the nose and for their lack of ambition. He wasn’t interested in his pack thinking for themselves. Noah Patrick was strong and grateful; Theo’s bite had changed him from a chimera into a regular werewolf. Gabe was strong but pretty dumb, though he also had a brutal streak that Theo had carefully cultivated. Gabe had brought along with him a friend of his, a timid boy named Nolan, but even timid werewolves had their uses. 

They weren’t geniuses or heroes, but, then again, they’d also never ever have the nerve to challenge him. Theo had enough people challenging him. 

Theo relaxed in the recliner, pretending he was happy to see all of them. A cold soda was on the table next to him. He brought it to his lips but then he caught the glitter in Stiles’ eyes.

“Who brought the drinks?” Theo asked the room.

“Stiles did, Alpha.” Nolan immediately answered. He was a bit of a sniveling worm.

Theo sighed, a long suffering sound that others were used to. “This better not be poisoned, Stiles.”

Stiles flashed him that deceptive smile. “Poisoned? I’m shocked that you think I would try to poison you … _again._ ”

“I told you what would happen if you kept trying to kill me.” 

“No,” Stiles lifted a finger. “You told me what would happen if I tried to kill you again and failed. I guarantee you, that when I do try to kill you again, I won’t fail.”

Theo laughed, openly and deliberately. He had to show the others he wasn’t afraid of the Void. “Remind me why I keep you around again?”

“Because I’m smarter than everyone else in this room put together, I’ve been the reason that you’ve defeated your enemies more than anyone else in this so-called pack, you’ve never stopped wanting me so much that it overrides your common sense, and I am almost excruciatingly humble.” Stiles winked at him.

The betas shifted nervously and Malia was … frustrated. The three of them didn’t like Stiles, and Stiles had little use for them in return. Malia’s relationship with Stiles was far more complex. They were the only two members of the McCall pack that were still actively involved with things in Beacon Hills, and that tie – that knowledge of what things were like before – paradoxically kept them near each other and yet seldom willing to interact. 

That distance was all good for Theo. It was a delicate game, keeping the pair of them more focused on him than on repairing their relationship with each other.

“Whatever.” Theo affected himself being bored. It wouldn’t fool Stiles, but it would reassure the dumbasses. “Any problems to report?”

Gabe looked up. “You remember how you asked me to keep an eye out for the Hales. Hasn’t been any sign of Derek, but that Peter fellow’s been sniffing around.”

Theo gestured impatiently. “Sniffing around where?”

Stiles cackled from his chair; Theo shot him a glare. Malia frowned but said nothing. The betas didn’t know that Peter was her father, Malia wanted it that way, and Theo never objected to having another card to play.

“The library. Miss Simcox had to chase him out. It was weird though.”

Theo tounged the inside of his mouth where a fang had dropped without his intending it to. After taking the alpha power from Liam, he had become a full werewolf. He had been theoretically aware, of course, how they could lose control of their shift when they were excited or upset, something that never had happened to him as a chimera. “Weird how?” He managed to lisp that around the teeth.

Stiles burst out into laughter again.

“He was holding something, it looked like an old camera? A really old camera.”

Theo turned to Stiles but had to wait until he could master his own emotions long enough for his teeth to recede. “Any ideas?”

Stiles ran a tongue over his lips like he was thinking of being obstinate, but he decided to be helpful. “No. Never heard of anything about an old camera, but it’s Peter. He’s got access to all sorts of arcane secrets, and they don’t mean anything good for anyone but himself. After you killed Monroe and Gerard, you should have forced his ass back into Eichen …”

“As you’ve said, _repeatedly._ ”

“As I’ve said repeatedly.” Stiles slid off his seat and sidled up to Gabe, who shifted uncomfortably. “You’re not first person to ignore my warnings about Peter. He’s a snake. He’s a liar.” Stiles lifted a hand as if to touch Gabe, who shied away, but then Stiles turned cold eyes on Malia. “He’ll use any emotional attachment he can find to get his way. You know the type, don’t you, Theo?”

 _So he knows we’re fucking. Good._ Theo grinned at him. “So, what would you have us do, if I don’t choose to ignore your warning this time?”

“Kill him. Burn the body.” Stiles was still focused on Malia. “Spread the ashes at the Nemeton. Only way to be sure he stays dead this time.”

Malia was glaring back at Stiles. “Fine with me.”

Theo coughed pointedly, getting both of their attention. Having them at odds was useful in keeping himself safe, but he couldn’t afford it breaking out into direct hostilities. Time to shift the discussion. “Lydia have anything for us?” 

The question served its purpose; Stiles turned to face him. “She hasn’t given me any warnings, but that doesn’t really mean anything. I told you she’d be less effective all the way in Cambridge.”

Theo nodded. “She’s back for the Winter Recess, isn’t she?”

“Natalie and Lydia have gone skiing. She might visit before she heads back to MIT.”

“Will she be back?” Malia asked too softly for anyone not a werewolf to hear. The regret was palpable.

“That was the deal. The pack keeps her mother safe, and in return she makes herself useful.” 

Stiles smirked nastily. “Uh-huh. We keep her mother _safe._ ”

“Stow the bullshit. It’s the same deal as with your father and Malia’s father, Stiles, and we have fulfilled the spirit of that deal.” Theo pointed out unnecessarily. “Okay, before I make a decision on Peter Hale, any sign of the other people I’ve told you to be on the lookout for?”

Nolan had been looking at the ground so intently that he didn’t realize that Theo, while he had been asking the question of everyone, had been looking intently at him. Noah nudged him.

“What? No. No one’s visited Mrs. McCall.” 

It became clear after senior year that anyone they pack needed to keep an eye out for would stop by the former alpha’s mother. Nolan was not only inoffensive but also rather vulnerable, and Theo was using that to good effect. It hadn’t taken much manipulation for Theo to arrange an opportunity for Melissa to develop feelings for the boy. Nolan was a sad sack and in over his head.

With the phone call on his mind, Theo was glad there wasn’t anything else going on that would need his attention.

“Okay.” Theo stood up. He hoped that his meeting the next day had nothing to do with whatever that scoundrel Hale was up to. “Find out where Peter’s staying. We’ll pay him a visit and encourage him to leave town.”

“Encourage?” Malia didn’t like her biological father, but she obviously didn’t want him killed. 

“Strongly encourage.” Theo replied. He noted that Gabe’s eyes lit up with the opportunity. “Thanks for coming.”

Malia headed out immediately. They already had had sex, and she probably wanted to be at home with her adopted father and his extended family. She liked to maintain the illusion with him that she was normal. She didn’t have to work at the restaurant until later that night anyway.

Nolan and Gabe left together. Gabe just took it for granted that the other wolf would follow him, and he did. Noah wanted to show Theo his new phone, and Theo pretended like he was interested. Of them all, Noah wanted to be friends, and Theo managed most of the time to act like he cared. 

Stiles lurked in the rec room like a deranged gargoyle.

“What?” Theo said nastily. 

“You’re good at this.”

“At being alpha?” He flashed his eyes at Stiles. He knew that it always pushed Stiles’ buttons to see the red in them. 

“No. At pretending to be alpha. At pretending you have it all under control.” 

Theo flopped back down in the seat. “It’s been two years, Stiles, are you ever going to get tired of trying to needle me?”

“Nope!” Stiles folded his hands behind his back. “It’s far too entertaining.” 

“Pissing me off is not going to bring him back. It’s not going to change the outcome of what happened or how it happened the way it did.”

“You think I don’t know that?”

“Then what’s the point of being an asshole? You can get everything you want if you work with me, if I could trust you, instead of worrying about you trying to screw me at every turn.”

Stiles smiled the cold smile that only happened on days like this. “You don’t get it, Theo. Screwing with you is exactly what I want. You wanted me; you got me. Now you get to choke on it.”

Theo flipped him off. 

“Do you think you having sex with Malia is supposed to hurt me?”

“As a matter of fact …”

“You’ve been having sex with her for six months. I knew all about it, and I get it. I get why she tried to hide it. She couldn’t bear to be with a basket case like me. But she doesn’t love you. I know that, because I’m the one who taught her what love meant. I taught her how to care. You taught her how to manipulate people, and that’s what she’s doing. Manipulating you so she can make sure she and Lydia and her dad are safe.”

“Again, I’m waiting for the point, Stiles.”

“Oh, I’ve made my point.”

“That point is you’re just bat-shit crazy.” 

“No! Well, yes! But today, I’m just waiting for you to figure out how bat-shit crazy you are to think this has a happy ending.”

**********

The coffee shop was insipid. The coffee was far too expensive, the light too garish, the clientele mortally self-absorbed, the waitstaff harried and uninspired. Theo gave it six months before the whole place folded. If he was lucky, he could avoid coming here again before it did. The post-Christmas shopping crowd no longer swamped the front counter, and it was almost empty, though it didn’t close for another hour.

Theo hated the face sitting across from him, as much as he hated being summoned. When he was summoned, it was usually by one of the Doctors, but today, it had been by … him. And that meant so much condescending etiquette and the unconvincing appearance of politeness, when in the end, all it was a power play.

And Theo had no idea what the Beast of Gevaudan wanted.

“And how do you fare, mon petit louveteau?” Sebastian Valet asked disingenuously over an espresso. The resurrected serial killer actually made an effort not to completely fit into the world he found himself living in, as if he were too good for it.

“I’m wonderful.” Theo gave it as much sarcasm as was safe. 

“Somehow I do not think that you are being sincere!” Valet thought he was a wit. “Is there something the matter, my friend?”

“You were going to leave. All of you. You were going to go France or Egypt or China or somewhere else.” Theo grated. “Beacon Hills was to be _mine._ ”

“It is yours.” The Beast chuckled. “For the present. But your assistance is needed on a matter of great importance.”

“I did what they needed for years.” Theo didn’t glower, but he let his anger through. “I don’t owe them anything else, and I certainly don’t owe you anything.”

“Ooof. Someone has gotten – how do they say it – too big for their britches, no? You’re their creation, and as they are loyal to me, that makes you, in a way, mine. Now, I don’t have much use for children or a pack of children, but you’re no longer a child! You’re becoming a fine young man. I’m eager to see what you will become in the future.” Valet finished off his espresso and put the cup down. His voice suddenly carried a very distinct threatening tone. “And I’m sure you’re eager for that as well, but if you insist on being intransigent, neither of us will get the chance to see it.”

If Theo clenched his hand on his own coffee cup any harder, he would shatter. He didn’t feel very much like an alpha. “What do you need?”

“I need to bait a trap. Monsieur McCall is very persistent for an officer of the law. While he’s been no real threat, he has become quite an inconvenience. I want to hunt when and where I wish to hunt, and he has been the reason I’ve had to change my plans more than once. It’s time he joins his son in the afterlife.”

“You’re …” Theo couldn’t believe this. “You’re asking me to help you kill a federal agent?”

The Beast met his gaze with the slightest hint of humor. “I’m not asking.”

Moments passed as Theo weighed the options. He was an alpha, and he had a pack. It looked like Valet was alone. If he could somehow get his pack here …

“Oh, mon petit louveteau, I see the wheels turn behind your eyes. Would you try your strength against mine? It might be the most entertaining you have ever been. Of course, were you to try to bring your pack against me, I would make sure certain people knew certain things that could … erode your pack’s _esprit de corps._ ”

“You don’t know anything …”

“True. I don’t know, but my host certainly did. He knew their parents. He knew their friends. He even knew their phone numbers. Do you really think that your pack would rally around you if I threatened their loved ones?”

It was true. He would lose Malia and Stiles and even access to Lydia. And all three of them would try to strip him of his betas. Theo gritted his teeth; he was caught. “What did you want me to do?”

Sebastian laid out his plan. It was a good plan – if you didn’t care what happened to Theo or his pack after the plan was over. Theo and his people would start creating incidents designed to attract the attention of the FBI, culminating with an attack on Melissa McCall. 

“Are you serious?” Theo replied when the Beast finished. “Even if this goes exactly as planned, there’s a good chance that half my pack will end up in jail and the other half will hate me even more than they do now! Melissa’s essentially Stiles’ foster mother!”

“You can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs.”

“They’re not your eggs, they’re mine!”

“Oh?” Sebastian leaned forward in the seat and his eyes turned their vicious bluish-white. “Are they?”

Theo gave serious thought to challenging the Beast right there and right now. Fuck the coffee shop. Fuck the patrons. 

“Ahhh, I see. You thought that once you got your red eyes, once you got these collection of foolish children you call a pack to follow you, you thought that you would no longer be beholden to your betters. That you would be free.” His chuckle was dark and nasty. “Youths nowadays are so deluded. The world is simple – you are either predator or prey, though sometimes it can be hard to tell. Which one you are in any given situation depends on … power. So, right now, right here, you have to answer a question. Are you predator? Or are you prey?”

Theo thought of all the things he had to win in the fight with the Beast, and all the things he had to lose in a fight with the Beast. The answer was clear. He dropped his eyes.

“We’ll be in touch when the plan is to begin.”

Theo got up with the mocking eyes of the Beast following him. He would have said that he felt like a wolf with its leg in the snare, but there was more than one snare. There was his own pack, there was Malia and Stiles, there was the Beast and the Doctors, and there was even more people that wanted him dead or captured. He couldn’t escape; he couldn’t even chew his own leg off to escape the snare.

There was only the darkness of the cold night.

**********

“Theo!” The voice echoed in his ears, full of concern. Someone was shaking him. Did he attack Sebastian and get his ass kicked? He must have blacked out.

Except Theo wasn’t on the floor of a destroyed coffee shop. He was lying on his back on dirt and rocks, and the sun was shining in the sky. He was in the desert. 

Scott was the one shaking him. “Theo. Oh, thank God.” The alpha started looking him over to make sure he wasn’t injured. “Are you okay? Can you sit up?”

Theo nodded, blinking, and pulled himself up so his back was leaning against that jeep. He was disoriented. 

Scott shoved a bottle of water into his face. “Have some of this. What happened?” 

Theo took a deep breath, but before he could answer, in the distance, he saw the skin-walker standing on a rock, looking at the pair of them. Scott was bent over him, taking care of him as if he had been assaulted or something.

“I passed out.” He took the water from Scott. The next lie fell easily from his lips. He didn’t want to burden Scott with the knowledge that the skin-walker had sent him into a waking dream. “I should have drank more water before we got here.”

Scott didn’t look completely convinced. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.” Theo gave Scott a big smile, and it wasn’t fake at all. The next words wouldn’t be a lie, because he could feel them down deep. “Everything is exactly how it should be.”


End file.
